


Cause Problems On Purpose

by ETraytin



Category: The Good Place (TV), Untitled Goose Game (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fusion, very silly, when you have eternity you have to make your own fun
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-05
Updated: 2020-02-05
Packaged: 2021-02-28 04:41:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,088
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22577971
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ETraytin/pseuds/ETraytin
Summary: It is a beautiful day in The Good Place, and Eleanor has learned an exciting new trick.
Relationships: Jianyu Li | Jason Mendoza & Eleanor Shellstrop, Tahani Al-Jamil & Eleanor Shellstrop
Comments: 4
Kudos: 68





	Cause Problems On Purpose

**Author's Note:**

> Okay, I've spent days now drowning in bittersweet finale feels and that is lovely, but I need to shed the sadness for awhile. Here is a glimpse of life in The Good Place, or perhaps a reimagining of the circumstances of my favorite computer game. Either way, it is under no circumstances to be taken seriously. Hope you enjoy!

It was another perfect day in the Good Place, seventy degrees and sunny, no clouds, no bugs, and no pollution. Around a thousand years ago Janet had changed the neighborhood algorithm to allow for occasional rainy days and a month here and there of perfect summer, autumn or winter, but for the most part the Good Place was a world of beautiful late spring weather. Eleanor was taking advantage of it by lazing in her hammock with a pitcher of margaritas and a bendy straw comically long enough that she could leave her drink on the ground and still drink it. It was a nice way to spend time, but it was also getting a little boring after a zillion similar perfect days. Once Chidi came home from the library she wouldn't be bored anymore, but that could be weeks yet. It was time to find something to do. 

As though summoned, Jason vaulted over the backyard hedge and nearly crashed into one of the hammock trees. “Eleanor, Eleanor, guess what?” 

Eleanor sat up abruptly, setting the hammock to swinging dangerously. “You scared the shirt out of me!” she told him, putting a hand over her heart. “What is it? Did Blake Bortles finally make it in?” Her eyes rounded. “Did Stone Cold Steve Austin?” 

“No!” Jason replied dismissively, “or I don't know, but I guess not? Janet would tell us! But look what I can do!” He gave her a wild grin, then turned into a dog. 

“Holy fork,” Eleanor burst out after a moment of stunned silence. “You can do that? We can do that? How did I not know we could do that?” 

Jason turned back into a human and laughed at her shock. “Dope, right? I just was thinking about how great it would be to be a dog, how dog heaven would be so awesome with being able to play ball all day and run around and drink from giant toilets, and suddenly I was a dog!” He changed again, this time into a penguin wearing a Jacksonville Jaguars jersey. 

Eleanor scrambled out of the hammock, margaritas and laziness forgotten. “I gotta try this. Though you know,” she added, “you could technically play ball all day and drink from a toilet here, if that's what blows your hair back.” Penguin-Jason gave her a squawk that suggested it was not at all the same thing. “I'm just saying. Okay, you just have to concentrate really hard on wanting to be something?” She scrunched her eyes tight shut, concentrated hard, and felt herself change. 

Opening her eyes, she found herself looking down on green, scaly feet that were suddenly much closer to her face. She lifted one up, flexed the claws experimentally, swished her tail. That felt very weird. “Wow...” she tried to say, but it came out as a weird sneezing noise. She concentrated on wanting a mirror, and suddenly one was sitting on the ground next to her, reflecting her in all her brand new iguana glory. It was cool. She opened her mouth wide and ran straight at Jason. 

They chased each other around the yard for awhile, freely switching animal forms to avoid obstacles or gain a tactical advantage. Forms with two legs or that were low to the ground were much easier; Eleanor stumbled and nearly fell into the pool when she tried to gallop as a horse, and Jason did fall in when his racing cheetah form was unable to brake or turn in time. Neither of them could fly very well in any form; it seemed like that was the sort of thing that would take practice. 

When they were both exhausted, they flopped down as gasping humans on side by side pool lounges. “That was awesome!” Jason enthused. “I gotta learn about more animals! I remember Pillboi and I went looking once for a frog you could lick and it would get you high, but all the ones we found just tasted real bad and one of them made me puke a lot. I could be that kind of frog, but then I couldn't lick me, I guess.. Do frogs have tongues?” 

Eleanor slanted him a look. “Yeah, they've got super-long tongues, they catch bugs with them. How do you not know that?” 

“Oh yeah!” Jason slapped his palm lightly against his forehead. “Those kinds of frogs! I guess I was thinking like Kermit the frog.” 

“Okay, we've obviously got to take you to visit Jeff again,” Eleanor decided. “Hey, do you think Tahani and Chidi know about this?” 

“I don't think so, Chidi doesn't like to try new things if we don't do them first,” Jason pointed out. “And Tahani would be like a unicorn or something and we would notice.” 

“Point,” Eleanor allowed. “We should definitely use this to mess with them. What's say we-” 

Janet booped into existence next to Jason's chair. “Hi there!” she told them both. “Jason, your father is waiting for you in the stadium. He says to tell you to bring the extra spicy wings for the party.” 

“Oh yeah!” Jason said again, jumping up. “This is a big day!” he told Eleanor. “We're on game 69,420! It's the perfect number!” 

“Nice,” Eleanor acknowledged with a tip of her head. “Maybe this will be the one.” 

“Probably not,” Jason admitted, “I don't play so good when my fingers are covered in wing sauce, but it's worth it. You wanna come?” 

“I might stop by later,” she told him. “I've got some other stuff to do. I'm gonna go show Tahani about the animal thing.” 

“Cool cool cool,” Jason nodded. “Tell her she can come too if she wants, and I'll start teaching her how to play!” 

“It's on her list,” Eleanor acknowledged, raising a hand in a lazy wave as Jason and Janet booped away. The smell of warm chlorine and the feel of sticky plastic against her back invited her to stay and drowse awhile, but she had bigger fish to fry. She stood and brushed all the grass and dirt off herself, then headed back to her house. As she walked through the green door she was suddenly clean, freshly showered, and in Tahani's backyard. 

Backyard might not have been quite the word for it. After spending a few hundred years learning the building trades and using them to perfect her dream home, Tahani had turned her attention first to landscaping, then to agriculture. With each new hobby she'd expanded her acreage a little more, so that now the area behind the mansion was a vast and verdant expanse that was so large and well-tended, new residents had started putting their homes on it. Most of them were Tahani's apprentices, staying close by while they learned gardening or beermaking or orienteering, or any of the thousand other things Tahani had made herself expert at. It was like a little village right on the edge of the neighborhood, very cute. And because one of Tahani's newer projects was animal husbandry, there were lots of animals around. 

Eleanor didn't see Tahani anywhere, and that was great. It would be much more fun to surprise her. She skirted the edge of the village near the pond and encountered a small flock of white geese sunning themselves on the bank. The second they caught sight of her, they rushed in her direction, hissing and honking. Even in the Good Place, geese were still ashholes. Eleanor knew a thing or two about dealing with ashholes, so she turned into a goose and hissed right back, which definitely surprised them. They didn't know what to make of her, but after a few more honks and some wing-shaking, they subsided and left her alone. Pleased, Eleanor waddled up the bank and into the village. 

The first obstacle she encountered was a gate leading into the big garden patch. She hadn't really been thinking about doors and gates and things when she took this form, but changing into a monkey or something now would spoil the game. A little radio nearby was playing a Kamilah song, no longer forbidden now that she and Tahani were getting along like real sisters. This was one of her new, post-death pieces, and Eleanor wasn't really a fan. Sure it was catchy and had a great beat and lyrics that got stuck in your head for days, but it was still a Kamilah song. Tahani may have done the grown-up thing and forgiven her sister all the miserable years on Earth, but Eleanor had been there for all the years when Tahani was messed up and sad about it, and was willing to carry the grudge on her behalf for just a few more bearimies. 

Waddling over to the radio, Eleanor grabbed awkwardly with her beak and pulled it off the table. It was very heavy! Luckily, the pond wasn't far away. The radio made extremely amusing gluggy song noises as it sank beneath the mirror-smooth surface, and Eleanor ruffled her wings in satisfaction. Job well done. Doubly well done, in fact, because one of the apprentices had come out of the gate to see what had happened to the music. Eleanor honked and rushed him, and was safely through the gate before he'd stopped cowering. She was a strategic mastermind. 

Being an animal was actually very interesting; it came with a whole different suite of sensory experiences and instincts. Her eyes were suddenly way the hell on the sides of her head, which made seeing a little tougher, but she could suddenly see more colors than she had before. Maybe this was what it was like to be able to see tension in the air, or pleurigloss for that matter. Everything around her seemed much, much bigger in this smaller body, and she was also feeling very aggressive somehow. Much more so than normal, which was kind of a lot. It wasn't directed anywhere in particular, more just the amorphous feeling that if somebody came near her, she'd probably bite them. 

She was debating the best way to get to high enough ground to spot Tahani when she heard a bell ringing nearby. Curious, she made her way over to a broad patch of lawn and found a meditation class in session. A woman who was not Tahani but was clearly cribbing her style led the class in soft chanting, punctuated by her occasional ringing of a little golden bell. It was a great bell. Eleanor didn't even know why she wanted it, but she definitely did. Lucky for her, everyone's eyes were already closed and they didn't notice the soft whap-whap-whap of her webbed feet on the grass through the noise of the chanting. The first they heard was the sudden wild ringing noise as Eleanor grabbed the bell and ran with it. 

It took everyone in the highly disrupted meditation class a few seconds to untangle themselves from lotus position, which gave her a good head start on the pursuit. The bell continued ringing as she ran and it was amazing, so loud and so obnoxious. The Tahanna-be leading the class was surprisingly agile and had much longer legs than Eleanor, very unfair, and quickly began closing the distance. 

Eleanor changed course and ran under the long raised deck behind the mansion, the bell echoing in the enclosed space. Stymied, the meditators stopped at the edge of the deck, peering into the darkness and hopefully calling “Here, goosey, goosey!” and clucking their tongues. She feinted at them, spreading her wings and honking til they jumped back in alarm. The little group milled about in agitation for a few moments, arguing about what to do, then remembered they could just imagine themselves a new bell. As soon as they were gone, Eleanor abandoned the now-uninteresting bell and continued her quest. 

Hopping up the steps to the top of the deck took some effort, and Eleanor resolved to figure out the flying thing as soon as possible. She could fly as a human, of course, that had been one of the first things she'd learned on arriving in the real Good Place, but doing it with wings and physics was much more complicated. She also wasn't a hundred percent sure that white geese could fly. Maybe she'd ask Tahani about that later. 

Motion from near the house drew her attention, but it wasn't Tahani there, either. Kamilah was painting something, all interlocking circles and weird infinity signs that looked especially strange in goosevision. Kamilah was good now, Eleanor reminded herself, then reconsidered. Was she really? Was she sufficiently humbled for all the pain and angst and lack of confidence she'd caused Tahani during their mortal lives? Probably mostly, Eleanor had to allow, but not so much that she didn't deserve to be messed with a little bit. 

Ducking down low for extra sneakiness, Eleanor made her way along the deck and up behind Kamilah and her canvas. Kamilah was humming the exact same song that had been on the radio. Who hummed their own music, no matter how catchy it was? She definitely sucked. Eleanor scooted up till she was just behind Kamilah, took a deep breath, and honked as loudly as she could. 

Kamilah shrieked, her paint palette and brush flying as her body jolted with surprise. Bright splotches of paint hit her, the canvas, and Eleanor's white feathers in one impressive spray. It was magnificent. Eleanor grabbed the paintbrush and ran away with it, feet whup-whup-whupping against the deck. “What the fork?” Kamilah asked behind her, sounding almost plaintive. She didn't pursue Eleanor at all, which was very disappointing. Eleanor dropped the paintbrush into some shrubbery, splattering them with blue and yellow and maybe pleurigloss, then continued her quest. She was beginning to think Tahani might be in the house, and that was going to be difficult. 

As usual, there were a bunch of people in Tahani's house. Apprentices working on projects, people taking classes, new residents who stayed in the guest rooms until they were ready to create their own homes. Eleanor selected a sliding glass door on the side of the house, tapped on it loudly several times, then hid in the bushes. A confused looking man with a pair of knitting needles came to the door, looked around, then went away. Eleanor tapped again, even louder. He came back, frowned as he looked around, then went away again without opening the door. People just couldn't help a goose out, honestly. 

She tapped again, and this time he opened the door and stepped out fully, trying to see what was making the noise. Eleanor burst from the bushes and whup-whup-whupped into the house before he even turned around. Her gratitude was such that she ignored the very tempting length of yarn he was trailing behind him in favor of racing down the hallway. 

Moving around undetected in the house was not as hard as it might be, not since Tahani had started trying to train animals to perform basic household maintenance. Eleanor grabbed a feather duster and tried to look like she knew what she was doing, and everyone mostly ignored her. Tahani's bedroom suite was on the first floor, thank fork, because that would've been a lot of very slippery hand-quarried marble stairs to hop up. Instead she made her way to the end of a long hall and nudged her way in through a half-open door that was much heavier now that she was a goose. She left the feather duster outside, figuring that the panda would come find it eventually. 

Tahani's rooms in this home were both bigger and emptier than they'd been in her first mansion all those years ago. She'd learned the beauty of open spaces and sunlight, leaving behind the chintz and fussy couches in favor of quiet décor and simple, comfortable furniture pieces. It was a nice look, but it made it tougher to sneak anywhere. In Tahani's old house, Eleanor could've hidden in the bedroom in human form for a week and not been found. Not that she'd tried it... not for more than a few hours anyway. It had been a weird reboot. 

Tahani was in her sunroom, a little alcove with floor to ceiling windows flanked with dozens of live plants. She was sitting crosslegged on the floor, reading a book and concentrating very hard. She didn't notice Eleanor's approach at all. Eleanor crept close, nearly close enough to touch, then craned her neck to see what Tahani was reading. She saw some kind of complex electrical diagram, but it was very hard to see or read when you could only look with one eye at a time. She was just leaning closer when Tahani looked up to see the goose barely a foot away from her face. Eleanor honked at her. 

“Oh!” Tahani jumped and scrambled backwards, her face a study in surprise. Eleanor tried to laugh, but it just came out as a weird gabbling noise. “How did you get in here? I haven't got any geese on staff yet.” 

Eleanor thought herself human, laughing for real when Tahani jumped again. “Eleanor! How did you- were you-?” 

“Pretty cool, huh?” Eleanor crowed. “Jason figured out we can turn into animals if we want. It's crazy fun.” 

“How did you wind up covered in paint?” Tahani asked. 

“Long story. Listen, you gotta try it,” Eleanor insisted. “I was a goose all afternoon and it was great. Think how much we could mess with Chidi when he gets back.” 

Tahani laughed. “I'm not sure that's very nice, but it's certainly a mental image. Perhaps I would enjoy being a gazelle or a stately lioness. Or a beaver, nature's own master builder!” she added brightly. Eleanor was a very good friend and did not laugh. “How does one go about turning into an animal?”

She was interrupted by a brisk knock on the door, followed by Kamilah walking straight in. She was liberally speckled with paint and looked annoyed. “Tahani, I know the livestock on the grounds are important to you, but is there any way we could keep them away from the-” She cut herself off, staring at Eleanor. 

Eleanor grinned blithely at Kamilah, surreptitiously wiping a little of the paint off her face. “Heeeey, Kamilah, long time no see! Anyway Tahani, I gotta go, stop by my place later and we'll talk!” She bounced to her feet and headed through the nearest green door before anyone could say anything. Definitely a strategic mastermind.


End file.
